All wars to end on New Year's Day

While I so love all that goes with Christmas, it is about much more than being nice and mushy.  Christmas is gutsy stuff.  Pope Francis appreciates this, when he challenges the world to stop all wars in 2025.  And he challenged the world to this two weeks before Christmas.  Foolish? Naive?  I do not think so.  

After all, why do we so simply accept or come to think it is normal practice to expect daily news of human destruction and bombings?  Is not such a mindset evil?  Why can't we think better of our world?  Why can't we challenge each other to rise up to the good that we can be?  

The usual Christmas greeting is "Happy Christmas".  I appreciate that Christmas cannot be reduced to personal happiness.  We can't always be happy and why should we?  Life is about much more.  So I wish ones a "Holy Christmas", "Much joy of the season" or simply "Peace".  

Joy goes to the heart of the matter.  It is of the heart and spirituality, and can never be taken away.  Like hope, joy and hope are the great values to be treasured and shared in real and active ways.  As for peace then, why not?  Ho! Ho! Ho!

The Journey is done Together

I am just back from a great three days in Singapore, which may be a small island, but it is full of wonder for a first time visitor.  What made it such a top experience was the people with whom I shared the journey.  

I went there to see a dear friend, who showed Om and me the ultimate in hospitality.  She even brought along some of her friends to accompany us on a full day tour of Singapore.  They had much to share and show.  They were all so kind and generous.  It was such a positive and refreshing experience of humanity, that I felt overwhelmed.  Thank you, my friends.   

Their planned tour for the day was jam packed, so much so that we did not achieve all they wanted to do.  So they kept expressing disappointment that they could not do it all, while I just responded that I was happy to do what we did.  At the end of the day, my good friends bemoaned what we didn't do, while I was most appreciative for what we did do.  

Then it struck me.  Neither party in this was wrong.  Rather, it was presenting two sides of the same stance in life.  Both sides are needed for a healkthy approach to life.  One side speaks of the human endeavour to achieve, of having a vision.  The other reflects human reality that we are limited and do fail, learning along the way.  Both stances are needed in life.  

Vision and reality go together in life.  It is about having a vision and living it.  Isn't that what the Christian Project is about?  We share God's vision for creation and live it as best we can, always moving forward, while often falling along the way.